ajc.com 2008 Holiday Guide

Gloria Williams has some unfinished business to take care of.

"I was up at 5:15 a.m. Friday shopping for my grandchildren, but I had one of them with me," the Tucker resident says early Saturday as she and her son Nathan stuff their basket at Toys R Us at Northlake.

She was one of many shoppers out the day after Black Friday searching for more weekend deals. But the challenge this go-round was finding discounts as deep as the day before.

"These stores are dead now, which is not good," notes Williams, who says she enjoyed excellent savings Friday at Northlake Mall and the Mall of Georgia. "There were better deals, and they should try harder to keep that going."

By 11 a.m., Toys R Us was still, in fact, eerily calm — shelves in order, no kids shuffling through aisles sampling the latest goodies. While associates wouldn't comment on whether recalls on Chinese-made toys were likely to affect sales, it was nearly impossible to ignore the ongoing controversy. The savings were just as noticeable.

The store touted the much-hyped Itsy Bitsy Spider-Man on a front display at a sale price of $19.98. The store also was out of the popular Nintendo Wii, on sale Saturday for $249. Also, the "NBA Live" game series for PlayStation 3 has been flying off the shelves, says an associate, as well the Sony PSP (PlayStation Portable).

A couple of other rising stars among toys this year include the Bratz Rock Angelz Bundle and the Hannah Montana Doll Tour Bus, according to Toys R Us.

But toys weren't on Lauren Wilson's mind at Macy's at Gwinnett Place Mall in Duluth. Between answering her cell phone and shifting her bountiful shopping bags around her arms, she had to pick out a bathrobe for a Christmas gift.

"Do you like the green one better or the cream," she says, instantly going to interviewer from interviewee.

"There are some really good deals out there," says the Atlanta resident who spent a long day Friday searching for gifts. "I was out at 4:30 a.m. yesterday at Wal-Mart, but you got to do what you got to do. It's worth it."

Still, it was difficult to ignore the surprising calm and low mall attendance Saturday.

"We're hoping it picks up later today," says Zee Boyd, assistant manager at Foot Locker at Gwinnett Place.

"We're doing well, but it's not as good as in past years," she notes around noon Saturday as about two customers inside check out various gym shoes.

Boyd says shoppers are likely being cautious because of the economy and gas prices.

"People are becoming a lot more aware, and it's going to take a lot of bargains to bring them in, but things will get better once people are more sure about the economy," she says.

Perhaps there's more calm because more people are choosing to forgo the long lines and parking issues to find good deals on the Internet.

Consumers, on average, will do 30.2 percent of their holiday shopping on Web sites, up from 28.9 percent last year, according to the National Retail Federation, a trade group.

Coming up is "Cyber Monday," when many online retailers will unveil Web site promotions, hoping to cash in on consumers who are back on the office computers, shopping at work.

But as for shops reserving their biggest deals for the Friday following Thanksgiving, Gloria Williams makes her point clearly: "That's their mistake. There should be good deals and coupons every day, or else this is the result — empty stores."